Category: Misc.

Dear James,

You don’t mind if I call you that, do you? For the vein of such a letter, something like Mr. McAvoy seems a tad formal… Unless I were to revert to some inner Jane Austin voice, which truthfully only pitter patters my heart a bit faster.
Then, of course, you would be Mister McAvoy…
*swoon*
…
…
Is it warm in here? My it’s a warm day, for September…
I feel faint…
You would have been the perfect man.
Er, for Jane, i mean.
I happen to adore my husband. He is my number one man.
If you ever, by chance, found yourself in Boise though, we could grab a drink and talk.
Or you could talk because, between you and I, I sort of just want to sit and listen to you for pretty much ever.
And see your smile…

Eventually, I would have to bring you home to meet my youngest daughter because you are Mr. Tumnis AND Penelope’s love. She wouldn’t stand for missing the chance to grill you for hours and hit you up for any acting contacts you might have for her…

My husband would meet you, as well. I hope that wouldn’t be too awkward, for you. You probably wouldn’t have to hide the love for me that you’d reciprocate. He’s pretty understanding. {He’s a pretty cool guy, my husband.}

Maybe we could just meet up somewhere on location…
That would be your location, of course. I am a writer… and not some cool travel journalist or anything, either. I am the sit at home, in pajamas type.
I promise not to wear pajamas on location. That’s just a home thing… I wear real clothes in public.
Or we could not go out in public. Whatever…

I am sure you are very busy so if you maybe just wanted to call me later, or skype me- skype is better- that would work. If you are feeling tired and drained you could just read to me. I’d love that too… Makes my intent to only listen seem a bit less awkward…

At any rate, today was a letter-to-my-crush day, and that- Mister McAvoy- is undoubtedly you…

XOXO,

Someone, somewhere, is crouching and waiting to give their opinion. Always. 

Apparently there is someone (or more than one someone) who feels that my post about my dog implies that she is laying on the brink of death and that we are, in reality, heartless and cruel dog owners planning on senselessly killing our beloved pet. 

Allow me to set the record straight, and if I did imply that things were different than they were- Then it was likely due to overwhelming grief. 

{Because, you know, I LOVE my dog.}

-She still eats, twice a day. 

-She enjoys “cookies” and other treats. 

-She plays, some. 

-She sleeps a lot. 

-She is mobile and, when excited, completely full of high energy. 

-She is still bossy and barks whenever she wants. 

For someone who is not here every bit of the day, with her, she might even seem like the same exact dog she was a year ago. But she isn’t. 

When she goes outside, to go potty, she squats for almost 10 minutes. After those 10 minutes, she releases less than a tablespoon of urine. This is because she has a cancerous tumor, in her bladder. the tumor is placed in a way that surgery is not an option. She would go into immediate kidney damage and die. 

Her bladder sits between 95 and 100% full, all of the time. Her urine is backing up into her kidneys. The early stages of kidney failure are setting in. At this stage that looks like clumps of hair just falling out, mild diarrhea and vomiting when her bladder gets too full.  This typically was occurring around 2 a.m. and again around 5 a.m. but we’ve started setting alarms to take her outside so that she does not have to endure that. 

There is a medication we can give her that will simply slow the cancer progression, prolonging her life by up to three months. We love her, we are selfish- of course we considered this. In fact, my husband who is not ready to say goodbye, decided this. Until the reality struck me that an incredibly full bladder is so painfully uncomfortable and she lives with that EVERY DAY. 

Could we ask her to endure that, and worse, because we weren’t ready to let her go? 

We have read up on actual kidney damage and what that looks like. It’s gruesome. I can’t see her like that. Our sweet pets, who become such a vital part of our family, they don’t have voices to tell us when they are hurting. They don’t have a way to communicate what they want… But when we visibly see her decline (even if it’s just little bits) everyday, we have no choice. 

She deserves to enjoy her last days.

As it is, we have no way of knowing how much pain she is in. 

We decided to give her a week. A week where every day we dote on her, love on her and give her things she loves. A week where we can try to process this significant loss that we are inching closer towards. 

As her people, who love her, this is our decision. While some people have made it clear that they feel killing her when she is “fine” makes us horrible monsters- we know that interceding for her, and breaking our own hearts before the quality of life is greatly reduced to one of complete hell for her, is the right decision. 

The thing about this stage of things is that they can turn south, fast. The vet said, without medication, we were looking at weeks left with her. If things go downhill, we will move up our appointment and put her to sleep sooner. 

To those of you who have sent sweet emails, and comments- thank you… Truly, thank you. 

Over the weekend my amazing friend Maggie attended a celebration in honor of World Breastfeeding week. While I whole-heartedly support breast feeding, it was obviously not something I ever experienced. I was sad over that, for a little bit- and then got over my funk and went about my face routine and shower. When Genny finally woke up she was complaining of a swollen/sore throat. The poor girl has been put through the ringer, allergy wise, this season. 

I got her settled down and then went on the hunt for something medicinal to save the day. Coming across two remaining tablets of Mucinex, I immediately popped the first tab- all urgent like- only for the horse pill to shoot into my bra. {I should back up to explain though, that we keep our small supply of medicine in a tray, in our walk in closet. We are a last resort sort of family, so it’s conveniently out of the way…} So there I am balancing this tray in one hand and holding the box of Mucinex in the other, at the back of my closet. Without pausing to think about how I could leave the closet and set the tray down to fish out the pill, I instead maneuvered my body to hold the tray against the shelving, transfer the box to the other hand and begin searching blindly (due to tray) in my brazier for said pill.

*sigh* 

And then I found it, and all at once three thoughts flooded my mind: 

– I can’t give this to her now that it was in my bra!

– of course I can, i just took a shower, and besides she needs two and that’s all we have. 

– Ha! and now I can say I have nursed her (the health) from my breast and be a cool mom too…

I should ask Maggie if it counts… which it totally does NOT, but still… 

This is an absolutely true story. Genny took the pill. I did think these things, (moderately ashamedly on the last one) and i did not change any details to avoid embarrassment. 

On a serious note: Kudos to you moms who were able to do the real thing! 

On an even more serious note: If you ever need an ibuprofin or something, from me, you might just open it yourself… It seems less risque… 

I interrupt your regularly scheduled monday to say that I’ve tweaked my comment settings in hopes to help those of you who have mentioned the inability to comment lately… 

Let me know! :) 

Before we went on vacation, I asked Genny to go through her clothes and try on the things she hadn’t worn in awhile. On our way to California we would be visiting friends who have a daughter a size or two below Gen. It only made sense to take her whatever clothes we could pass along while there. 

After an hour or so, in her room she emerged with a few t-shirts, some shorts and maybe a nightgown. (I forget) The point is, there wasn’t more than a normal Target bag, half full of clothes. Taking her word for it, I went on packing us for our trip. We passed the clothing along, our our stop there, and everyone was happy. 

After we came home I had Genny go through all of her clothes to make room for her school uniform pieces and so I had an idea of what I needed to start looking for. This time I wanted to see them. On her. 

Would you believe that ninety percent of her clothes did not fit her? 

Shocking, really, the invisible growth spurt that California sunshine must have caused was amazing. A closet full of dresses, and only 2 remained. The other fourteen were unable to be zipped up at all, or showed her knickers without her bending over. Every single last pair of her jeans were unable to be zipped up… 

hmmm… 

I divided them so that my niece could get some of the pieces she loves and boxed up the rest for our friend’s daughter who is now 8 hours away. 

Gosh, isn’t parenting fun???? :)